Galaxies, stars and planets

Introduction

For millennia, people have speculated about our place in the cosmos, with many traditions placing humans literally in a central position. Only in the last few centuries have observations and experiments gradually led us to the humbling conclusion that our position in the wider Universe is unremarkable. This course will describe our position in the cosmos, zooming out into our solar system and to larger scales, and also zooming the other way into microscopic scales. Throughout the journey, the course introduces some of the processes that are seen when viewing the Universe at these sizes.

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This OpenLearn course provides a sample of level 1 study in Science.